On the thirteenth of October, San Martin issued the following paragraph from the army press:
"People of Peru,—I have paid the tribute which, as a public man, I owe to the opinion of others: I have shewn what is my object and my mission towards you: I come to fulfil the expectations of all those who wish to belong to the country that gave them birth, and who desire to be governed by their own laws. On that day when Peru shall freely pronounce as to the form of her institutions, be they whatever they may, my functions shall cease, and I shall have the glory of announcing to the government of Chile, of which I am a subject, that their heroic efforts have at last received the consolation of having given liberty to Peru, and security to the neighbouring states."
The sequel will shew how these solemn promises were forgotten; and how the dreadful results which followed such a system of duplicity and deceit are characteristics which blacken the name of a private individual, and blast the honour of a "public man."
On the fifth of October, hostilities having recommenced, Colonel Arenales, with a division of twelve hundred men and two pieces of artillery, left Pisco for Ica, where he arrived on the sixth, and was received by the corporation and inhabitants of the city with the strongest marks of the most sincere enthusiasm in the cause of liberty. Colonel Quimper and the Count de Monte-mar, with a force of eight hundred men, fled from Ica, but two companies of infantry, with their officers, returned and joined Arenales. Part of the division under Arenales was sent to La Nasca on the twelfth, where they entered, and completely routed the enemy. Quimper and Monte-mar made their escape, owing to the fleetness of their horses; but all the baggage, consisting of arms, ammunition, and equipage, was taken, together with six officers and eighty privates.
On the fifteenth, about a hundred mules laden with stores belonging to the enemy were also captured; and Arenales having established an independent government at Ica, proceeded on his route towards Guamanga.
The troops of the expedition were distributed on the different estates in the neighbourhood of Pisco, Chincha, and Cañete, which either belonged to Spaniards, or Americans who had proved themselves inimical to the object of the liberating forces, particularly on those belonging to the Count of Monte-mar. All slaves capable of bearing arms, and willing to serve in the army of San Martin, were declared free; however, the number that presented themselves did not accord with the sanguine expectations of the chief, and his uneasiness at what he considered lukewarmness in general in the sacred cause began to produce impatience bordering on despair. He informed Lord Cochrane that he should remove his head quarters to Truxillo; but his Lordship fortunately advised him to desist from a plan which would undoubtedly at once have ruined all his hopes. Truxillo being at the distance of a hundred leagues to the northward of Lima, it would have been almost impossible for his troops to have marched across a country such as I have already described without experiencing the greatest privations; and for want of the necessary stores they could not possibly have returned by sea; besides, the division under the command of Arenales would have been abandoned to its fate, and almost delivered up to the enemy. The only temptation that such a position could hold out to San Martin was, that Truxillo is a walled city, easily tenable, and at a short distance from the sea-port of Huanchaco; however it was determined to remove the head quarters to the north of Lima, and on the twenty-second the troops began to embark.
On the twenty-sixth, the whole of the liberating expedition left the bay of Pisco, and on the twenty-ninth it arrived off Callao, where the vessels anchored under the island of San Lorenzo, presenting at once to Lima a view of the forces sent to free the metropolis of South America from the chains of colonial thraldom. On the thirtieth, the transports, under convoy of the San Martin, dropped down to the bay of Ancon; the O'Higgins, Lautaro, Independencia, and brig Araucano, still remaining in the bay of Callao.
On the third of November, his Lordship astonished the inhabitants of Callao, by sailing through the narrow passage that lies between the island of San Lorenzo and the main, called the Boqueron. Never had the Spaniards known a vessel of more than fifty tons attempt what they now saw done with a fifty gun frigate. Expecting every moment to see us founder, the enemy had manned their gunboats, and formed themselves in a line ready to attack us the instant they should observe us strike; to witness which, the batteries were crowned with spectators; but to their utter astonishment we passed the straight, leaving them to ruminate on the nautical tactics of the Admiral of the Chilean squadron.
Having passed the Boqueron, a ship and a schooner hove in sight; the ship proved to be English, the schooner to be the Alcance, from Guayaquil, bringing the news of the revolution and declaration of independence of that city and province, and having on board the ex-governor and other Spanish authorities. Guayaquil followed the example of the other South American cities in the manner in which she threw off the colonial yoke; the Spanish mandataries were deposed, and a new government established on the ninth of October, without any bloodshed, or even insults offered to the individuals deposed.